iOS 10: What features are reminiscent of your Android smartphone

Apple is touting iOS 10 as “the mother of all the releases”. The new iOS update for iPhone and iPad boasts of a “bigger, bolder and more brilliant” makeover. But in order draw clearer and more convenient conclusion, it is the time for us to evaluate critically whether Apple has far enough for successful debuts of iOS 10 or not.

Have you guys noticed? Drawing a parallel between your Android smartphone and iPhone, iOS 10 gets tougher than previous iOS versions. Android and iOS are certainly getting closer to each other with features and designs that mirror one another. If Android on your phone is starting to feel stale, iOS 10 can’t be counted on completely to breathe new life into an iPhone model in your hand.

Apple’s iOS 10 makes you closer to Android

In case you didn’t notice; here are the top features iOS 10 takes from Android.

New lock screen

Apple has scaled back its race to be thin when it comes to font weight. You will notice much thicker fonts in core iOS apps like the Music and also experience much thicker fonts for the lock screen date clock and date. Lock screen on iOS10 will remind you of Android 4.4 KitKat.

iOS 10 comes with a new lock screen

The iconic “Slide to unlock” that’s been there since Steve Jobs unveiled the first iPhone in 2007, is no more. Instead, the unlocking experience has been revamped with a “Press home to unlock” message. Pressing the iPhone’s Touch ID-equipped home button unlocks your Apple device, just like you unlock your Android device with a fingerprint.

Card-style notifications

Apple is taking design cues from Google notifications and attempting to deliver a similar interface on iOS 10. With rich interactive notifications and card-style design on iOS 10, you can do more without having to jump into an app. For instance, you can use the peek and pop feature 3D Touch to reply quickly without opening the messaging app. This is similar to the feature that available on Android since the launch of its Lollipop 5.0. Moreover, the same feature is there in Android 7.0 Nougat from the very first preview release.

A More open Apple Maps

Apple Maps is becoming a lot more useful with iOS 10. While the appearance has changed slightly; it’s really the functionalities and interface that are getting the big upgrade. The upgrade system allows users to search for a variety of things en route. It also notifies you about how much longer it will take to arrive with the stops included.

Apple Maps in a new look

Navigation also provides you traffic information when you’re on the road and can dynamically reroute you to keep you out of it. Additionally, Apple has opened up to third-party developers, allowing for users to perform certain tasks like request an Uber without having to open another app separately.

Collaboration in Apple Notes

As with the Apple Notes app, Apple has introduced a collaboration feature. This has been with Google’s Keep note making app since at most years now.

Siri gets a facelift

Siri becomes more dynamic, expressive and conversational, as it opens up to your favorite apps from App store. A great example of how this could be helpful is sending cash to someone using the Square cash app. You just need to say something like: “Hey Siri; pay Martina 50 dollars with Square cash.” The whole experience with the voice-based digital assistant is now quite faster, and your cash can now be transferred to any other account in an easier way than ever before.

Siri on iOS 10 comes with Google Now-like features

You will also be able to call for an Uber cab without ever needing to go into the app. Just access Siri and say, “Order me an Uber.” This applies to any company that adds support for Siri. The list of supported services moves from Uber to Lyft and Dominos as well. You could say “order me pizza from Dominos.” So basically if you are too tired to use your phone; you can ask Siri and order you a pizza or hail an Uber with all ease. Other Siri assistive features include contact info; calendar availability and contextual lookups.

In a nutshell, all these features will let other outside apps function using Siri’s voice commands. This something which has been the case with Google Now for quite some time.

Raise to wake

Raise to wake is quite a simple and transformative feature in iOS 10. It feels like iPhone should have had it for years. You just need to pick your iPhone to wake it up; it will lit up the display to show all the pending notifications. Google brought an Ambient Display with Android 5.0 Lollipop that enabled tens of smartphones to lit up some part of their AMOLED screen to show the clock and notifications.

Intelligent QuickType keyboard

QuickType keyboard – another major trait of iOS 10, is used to make contextual suggestions that go beyond single words. The significantly expanded contextual awareness suggests you an array of replies offered directly from Siri. Someone asking “where are you?” in messages, for instance, will prompt iOS to offer up your current location. Although this specific location is present there in Hangouts, Apple’s intelligent integration within the keyboard itself brings an intuitive upgrade.

iMessage with cosmetic changes

Apple’s significant changes to iMessage within iOS 10 seem mostly cosmetic. There is giant emoji, full-screen fireworks, and handwritten scrolls across photos and videos, tap back and catchy stickers. The Cupertino giant is certainly taking the kitchen sink approach to messaging.

These are features grabbed directly from Facebook Messenger, Snapchat and all other messaging apps on Android that are resonating with teenagers. However, the new iOS update still has a slight leg up on the competition with an end-to-end encryption for privacy nuts.

Photo app with facial recognition

The Photos app on iOS 10 has been updated with what Apple calls: “Siri’s Intelligence.” This essentially equates to some deep learning techniques and advanced facial and objects recognition algorithm. Just like we have seen in Google Photos that already available on both Android and iOS, Photos on iOS 10 scans a user’s entire photo gallery, intelligently detecting people, animals, places, and group photos together in a logical way. Apple also uses advanced artificial intelligence to surface your memories most relevant to you and combines them into movies and albums for easy sharing.

Ability to remove apps

Apple first time introduced this feature in iOS 10 and enables you to remove stock apps like Health, Photos and Calendar. This feature is already is already present on open source Android where you can remove stock Google apps such as Google Play Movies, Play Music and Photos.

The success of iOS and Android is on a converging path. These two platforms quite well adapt the ‘copy-paste’ business, but there is nothing wrong in that as it is how technology evolves. Nevertheless, the choice of operating system today depends less on some unusual features offered by either Android or iOS and more on your personal preference.